


More On The Meaning Of "The Corps Is Mother, The Corps Is Father"

by pallasite



Series: Behind the Gloves [91]
Category: Babylon 5, Babylon 5 & Related Fandoms
Genre: Backstory, Canon Compliant, Discipline, Essays, Fix-It, Gen, How canon misled you, Internal Corps Politics, Justice, Psi Corps, Telepath culture, The Corps is Mother and Father, The Psi Corps tag is mine, The Real Telepath Resistance Was Us, Worldbuilding, telepaths
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-22
Updated: 2018-01-22
Packaged: 2019-03-07 15:56:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,591
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13438188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pallasite/pseuds/pallasite
Summary: Long ago, a friend of mine (correctly) observed that every time someone inBehind the Glovessays these words, he or she means something slightly different.Indeed.It's all about context.So many meanings. So many.Now with concrete canon examples!The prologue ofBehind the Glovesishere- please read!





	More On The Meaning Of "The Corps Is Mother, The Corps Is Father"

**Author's Note:**

> What is this series? Where are the acknowledgements, table of contents and universe timelines? See [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/10184558/chapters/22620590).
> 
> If you like _Behind the Gloves_ and would like to send me an email, I can be reached at counterintuitive at protonmail dot com. Do you have questions? Would you like to tell me what you like about this project? Email me!
> 
> I also have an [ask blog](https://behind-the-gloves.tumblr.com/), a [writing blog](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/pallasite-writes), and a "P3 life" Tumblr [here](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/p3-life) with funny anecdotes. :)

Long ago, a friend of mine (correctly) observed that every time someone in _Behind the Gloves_ says these words, he or she means something slightly different.

Indeed.

It's all about context.

In [this recent essay](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12920646), I described one of those meanings:

       "It is to be expected then, that the show would have you believe that "the Corps is Mother, the Corps is Father" means something like "Big Brother is Watching You," that it means that certain telepaths are somehow the "real oppressors" of their population, and the rest are helpless little infantilized victims in need of rescue. As happens throughout canon, they flip things around 180 degrees to fit their narrative. Normals are scared of this expression because they know, deep down inside, that to many telepaths, especially those born in the Corps, it's an expression of telepath solidarity and power in the face of normal control - that this expression really means (among other things), "TO HELL WITH YOU NORMALS - ONE DAY, WE'LL GET BACK THE RIGHTS YOU STOLE FROM US. YOU'VE GOT IT COMING."

       "The Corps is Mother and Father - _not you_."

We see an example the expression used to defy normal control and abuse in the scene where fifteen-year-old Bester (by telepath age reckoning) faces the relatively newly-appointed Director Johnston in interrogation.

Even mumbled, the words are still a statement of resistance.

Deadly Relations, p. 76-79:

       Al straightened his uniform and tried not to appear nervous. He stared at the heavy door for a moment, steadied his breathing, forced the rhythm of his heart to slow from improvised jazz to a brisk march. He pushed the door open and stepped into a room he had never yet had the misfortune to see.

       Most of the classrooms and dorms were spare, white, clean, designed to keep the mind free from distraction. This room was just as minimal - starkly so - but was weighty and dark, as if cut and burnished from a basalt cave. A single shaft of light awaited him, and beyond - raised above, behind a long bench - he could make out the five members of the review board, faces spectral in the dim, amber light of reading lamps.

       "Alfred Bester, come forward."

       He stepped into the light, resisting the urge to squint. Of those regarding him, he recognized only two. One was Dr. Hatathli, the principal of the Minor Academy; the other was Rebbekah Chance, the ranking Teeptown Psi Cop. Seated in the center was a third, who looked familiar, but Al couldn't quite place him. Someone important, probably from the director's office. Maybe even one of the assistant directors.

       [It is a dark room, so he cannot yet see that the man in the center does not wear gloves]

...

       "I have a better question. Mr. Bester," [asked Director Johnston] "how did you so easily recognize this rogue telepath?"

       Al suddenly remembered himself, long ago, when he and Cadre Prime had played that fateful game of cops and blips. The normal in a military uniform, at the statue of William Karges. Al remembered speaking to him. He remembered the flash of hatred...

       This was that man. Al took a deep breath. "Sir, I hope to be a Psi Cop one day. I like to go to the West End station and look at the hunt lists."

       Ms. Chance nodded. "That's confirmed by the officers there."

       The normal didn't turn toward her. His voice, however, was of deep winter. "When I require information, Ms. Chance, I will ask for it."

       "Yes, Director."

       Al felt his face twitch and [cursed to] himself. _It's the director himself. And not the one I knew._

       "Mr. Bester. Let us dispense with parceling out details. You went AWOL. You did so in the apparent company of a rogue telepath. The security officer of the train was found bound and gagged, and the Psi Cop who was to arrest you at the Lyon station murdered. You disappeared for several hours in Paris and were found, wounded, in the company of not one rogue telepath, but two. A scan while you were unconscious revealed that you knew the location of an underground safe house." He paused to glare at Al.

       "Well?" the director said, after a moment.

       "I'm sorry, sir," Al replied. "I was not aware I had been asked to speak."

       [As I've said [elsewhere](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12656673), in the Corps, children do not speak up to adults unless asked to do so. When the director (above) applies the same rules to Ms. Chance, the _ranking Teeptown Psi Cop_ , he is intentionally [infantilizing her](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12920646) in front of her peers and a student.]

       "Speak," the director said, disgustedly, waving his [bare] hands.

       "Sir, if I was scanned, and the information passed to you, then you must also be aware that I never had - nor ever could have - any intention of becoming a Blip. My allegiance is first, last, always to the Corps. The Corps is mother, the Corps is father."

       As he said it, he heard Chance and Hatathli murmur it along with him. He felt suddenly more confident.

...

       [Bester] outlined the rest of his story, while the director sat in stony silence. "As I said, sir," he said, in finishing, "if I was scanned, you will know I am speaking the truth. If the scan was incomplete, of course I volunteer to be scanned again, as deeply as necessary."

       "I don't know that you are speaking the truth. I am not a telepath. I can only judge the facts at hand and testimony given."

       Al felt a wave of shocked outrage emanate from the other review board members, and he suddenly understood.

       The director hated telepaths. He did not trust them. And perhaps - for some unknown reason - he hated Al Bester in particular. The thought wasn't his alone, but filtered lightly through the room, and Al understood that some or all of the panel members were sending him a signal. _It's us against him. You are with us. Be careful._

\-----

I will discuss in detail later the substantial differences between "justice" in telepath culture and normal culture, but for now, there is just this to point out: in telepath culture, justice is based on the _truth_ , while in normal culture, it is based on the appearance of _process_ , whatever the truth actually may be. This is part of why scans are inadmissible in court: normals would prefer to have innocent people convicted, and guilty people walk free, so long as _dirty teeps_ don't corrupt their system.

As I said in [Crystal's story](http://archiveofourown.org/works/10816800/chapters/23998608):

       “What you’ve been taught in vids about the courts… There’s a lot they didn’t tell you. I’ve seen normals get away with murder.”

       Everyone knew that normals were violent to telepaths, and telepaths had to be very careful around them. “I know that,” she said. “That’s why the campus has high walls. That’s why we have Psi Cops to protect us.”

       “No Crystal, I mean the Psi Cops catch the criminals, and send them to court, and they get away with it anyway.”

       “But how? They’ve been caught.” At school, punishment was always fair. No one ever got punished for something they didn’t do, and no one who broke school rules ever got away with it. Crystal couldn’t imagine that even with their “trial” system, normals could let each other get away with murder.

       “Telepaths are not allowed to be attorneys or judges. We're not allowed to sit on juries. When they’ve killed a telepath, mundanes lie and say they didn’t do it, that it wasn’t them. They usually get away with it.”

       “Why can’t you scan them? Then everyone would know.”

       “I can’t – those are the rules.”

\-----

And in the Corps, who dies is literally within the power of the director. Though there may be "process" he must follow, in the end, who lives and who dies is within his discretion, under the authority of the charter.

What Bester does not yet know - because he is only fifteen, and the adults have kept "adult matters" from the students - is that the new director has an agenda of "reforming" the Corps to his taste, even if that means "retiring," exiling, or even killing telepaths who stand in his way or could potentially pose a threat to his power. (Bey eventually tells him, as a warning.)

The adults at the hearing, however (along with Bey, who shows up in the next moment), have made a collective decision not to let the director execute a student, even if that resistance costs them their careers, or even their lives.

Killing adults may be "fair game," but they will _not_ let him execute a student - not for his conduct, and not for some personal vendetta against the prior director. (When Bey takes personal responsibility for Bester in that same scene, the director makes explicit that Bey will personally be held accountable for any further misconduct on Bester's part. In other words, Bey is saving Bester's life for the _second_ time, even potentially risking his own life to do so - and because, unbeknownst to Bester, [he swore a promise to Director Vacit](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12106929).)

So while in that moment, Bester innocently says these words, "The Corps is mother, the Corps is father" as a statement of loyalty, when the adults murmur it with him, there is a deeper meaning. They're signaling their resistance to Johnston under the cover of a statement which "just means loyalty."

I think I've talked before about telepaths saying one thing while thinking another, and the juxtaposition revealing a third meaning? Have I mentioned that yet? This is an example.


End file.
